Planning ahead for lent in 2015? Here's an idea or two...
The Archbishop of Canterbury's lent book for 2015 is In God's Hands by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Here's what the publishers say...
In God`s Hands is the 2015 Archbishop of Canterbury`s Lent Book. In this little gem of a book, Archbishop Desmond Tutu distils the wisdom forged through a childhood of poverty and apartheid, an adulthood lived in the glare of the world's media, and the long and agonising struggle for truth and reconciliation in South Africa, into the childlike simplicity which Jesus tells us characterises the Kingdom of God.
Archbishop Tutu has produced a meditation on the infinite love of God and the infinite value of the human individual. Not only are we in God`s hands, he says, our names are engraved on his palms. Throughout an often turbulent life, Archbishop Tutu has fought for justice and against oppression and prejudice. As we learn in this book, what has driven him forward is an unshakeable belief that human beings are created in the image of God and are infinitely valuable. Each one of us is a God-carrier, a tabernacle, a sanctuary of the Divine Trinity. God loves us not because we are loveable but because he first loved us. And this turns our values upside down. In this sense the Gospel is the most radical thing imaginable.
It is extremely moving that in this book Archbishop Tutu returns to something so simple and so profound after a life in which he has been involved in political, social and ethical issues that have seemed to be so very complex.
Or there's this one...
Sacred Space for Lent 2015 by the Jesuits in Ireland. A budget choice at $3.95 here's the blurb...
Now in its ninth year of publication, Sacred Space for Lent 2015 continues to attract and retain a devoted readership for whom it serves as a complement to the hugely popular website sacredspace.ie, and as a daily Lenten resource of unmatched quality. Sacred Space for Lent 2015 is a convenient, pocket-size book that makes it easy to enter into prayer during Lent—the most important season of the year.
Using the simple six-step method first developed by St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuits, this booklet provides the same daily readings and prayer starters, accompanied by the weekly Lenten themes found in the larger book. Inexpensive and portable, Sacred Space for Lent 2015 is the perfect gift for your parish, campus ministry program, small group, friend, a family member, or for yourself.
And finally, Tom Wright's Reflecting the Glory
'You can't love an abstraction. You can't even love the idea of love. You can only truly love a person. The deepest, richest meaning of love must be personal love. The relevance of knowing God in Jesus is that when we love God in Jesus we discover how that love, that personal love, is given to us in order that it may be given through us.' This book of Bible readings and reflections, for every day from Ash Wednesday to the first Sunday of Easter, explores how we reveal Jesus even at the lowest and weakest points of our lives. Drawing on New Testament passages, with a particular focus on Paul's letters to the church in Corinth, Tom Wright shows that through God's Holy Spirit, the suffering but also the glory of Christ can be incarnate in our lives, enabling us to be the people of God."
